


Lanterns Lit

by ExpressAndAdmirable



Series: The Heroes of Light [71]
Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types, Final Fantasy I
Genre: Backstory, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Parent-Child Relationship, Religious Discussion, Slice of Life, Tiefling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 16:44:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16329797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExpressAndAdmirable/pseuds/ExpressAndAdmirable
Summary: Aviva and Esperance perform their yearly memorial ritual.





	Lanterns Lit

**Author's Note:**

> I started this draft about six months ago and only found the inspiration to finish it after the campaign was over and I'd started talking to the other players about our epilogue. I had the frame of this piece in mind the whole time, but it didn't feel right to write it while the story was still ongoing, particularly because it contains a bit of obvious epilogue foreshadowing.

She couldn’t find the candles. She could not, for the life of her, find the candles.

Esperance swallowed hard, trying quite unsuccessfully to quell the surge of anxiety that rippled through her chest. As a young girl, she would never have considered herself religious, nor even particularly superstitious; she was, however, possessed of a healthy respect for tradition and ritual that had only grown as she aged into adulthood and had a young girl of her own. This ritual, passed down through generations of women in what could generously be called their family, required only two tools: participants, and the damned bloody currently-missing candles.

“V? Baby? Have you seen the Festival candles??”

Aviva poked her head out of her bedroom, her fingers tangled in the imprecise braid she was working into her hair. “I have them in my pocket, mama,” she responded, as if it should have been obvious.

“You have them…?” Huffing a relieved laugh, Esperance shook her head. Of course Aviva had thought ahead, and of course she hadn’t mentioned that forethought. Her logical mind only extended so far. “Thank the gods. Are you ready to go?”

“Almost.” The girl disappeared into her room, returning a few moments later with her finished braid tied with a thin leather cord. She had pulled a jacket over her shoulders -- a thin, threadbare thing that would do little against the winter chill -- and as she slipped her arms into its sleeves, she nodded. “Now I’m ready.”

The early afternoon streets bustled with activity, though few gave the pair of Tieflings a second glance as they wound their way down the hill toward the bay. In some ways, Esperance was grateful it had happened in midwinter. Cornerians became far more focused in the cold, heading to and fro with a hurried purpose that left little time to gawk at passersby. It was small comfort given it was the ice that had been his undoing, but at least she and her daughter could move unmolested.

The bay was enveloped in a thick, grey fog that curled over the surface of the water, and as they walked toward the end of the pier, the city and its distractions faded from view. Each muted footstep took them further from the noise of the world and into their liminal space, the fog settling around them like a veil. If there was any place to commune with the dead, Esperance mused, this ghostly pocket of peace was it.

At the end of the pier, Esperance knelt. Aviva settled cross-legged at her side and produced the candles from her pocket; originally purchased for the Festival of Torches earlier in the year, no different than thousands of other candles, they would serve dual purpose as harbingers of remembrance. This year they likely could have purchased new candles, better candles, but Esperance had never been one to abandon a tradition once it had been established. Besides, if anyone would appreciate a bit of spiritual recycling, it would be the Goddess.

Retrieving matches from her own pocket, Esperance lit each candle in turn, then took one in hand. “Okay, baby.”

Aviva took a deep breath, watching the dancing flame and the wax beginning to drip slowly toward her fingers. “Mother of the lost and wandering, Bestower of Grace, bless those who have gone before their time. Keep them safe beneath your cloak. Shelter them from storms and sustain them in their need. Protect them as they find their way to the heavens, where they will live forever in your love.” She paused, thought, nodded. “Amen.”

“Amen,” Esperance echoed softly, looking out into the endless fog. “Now the way is open. What do you want to tell your father about the past year?”

Switching her candle to the other hand, Aviva settled more comfortably on the rough wood of the pier. “The Old Man decided I was big enough for full-sized string instruments this year. Normally he waits a bit longer, but I’m so tall for my age that he said my arms were long enough. It meant I could finally switch from the lute to the oud; he didn’t have any half-size ouds, but I like their sound better than the lute. And I started on the bouzouki and the sitar and the cello. I have a bit of trouble with the bouzouki still, but I’m almost there.” She wrinkled her nose. “He still makes me play the flute. I think he thinks it’s funny when I whine about it, but I _really_ don’t like it. Its sound is so boring!” A slight huff. “And, uhh… There’s a new cat who comes into the courtyard now. He’s small and grey and he likes green beans, so sometimes I give him a few after dinner.” Her prepared topics exhausted, Aviva looked to her mother for inspiration.

“Anything about school?”

The girl’s face fell a bit at the question. “I dunno. I did well in history, I guess. There’s a new maths teacher who’s kind of nice. In the spring we took a field trip to the Garden District to learn about the different flowers, and I liked that a lot. The Old Man taught me a song about cherry blossoms on the shamisen that week.” Esperance smiled to herself; it always came back to music with Aviva. “Now you go, mama. I’ll think of more.”

“Alright.” Esperance nodded. Far more had happened to Aviva at school that year, little of it good, but she was not about to press. “Hmm… We’re in the black for the second year at the shop. I got an order for bracers from the town watch that took a few months, but it set us up nicely for the slow season. I think I can finally say we’re stable, possibly on the move upward, especially if business stays as steady as it has done lately. I replaced the glass in one of the front windows, so there’s a lot more light, and more room for product.” She did not mention that the reason she had replaced the window was due to a large rock that had been thrown through the glass the month prior, setting her back quite a bit of coin. It never seemed worth it to bother the dead with the troubles of the living.

“Mama?”

“Hm?”

“Why am I not named after you or papa?”

Esperance tilted her head, one brow raised in confused curiosity. “Why do you ask?”

“There’s a boy in my class named Trey, or I thought it was -- everyone calls him Trey -- but he’s actually named George the Third. His papa is George Junior, and his granddad is George Senior. Why am I not Zahak Junior?”

“Ahh.” Still not entirely sure where the non sequitur had come from, Esperance nodded nonetheless. “Well, a few reasons. First, our people don’t believe in naming our children after someone living. It’s bad luck; having two people with the same name will confuse the spirits.” Aviva bobbed her head, acknowledging the logic of the statement without further question, so Esperance continued. “Second, if we’d named you after your father, your name would be Zahira, unless you later decided you were more comfortable as Zahak.”

Aviva brightened. “Zahira is pretty!”

“So is Aviva, my darling!” Esperance laughed. “It _is_ customary to name our children after those who have departed: as remembrance, and in the hope that our ancestors will watch over you, and some of their traits will influence you. That’s why we named you after my mother.”

“What was Grandma ‘Viva like?”

“Smart,” Esperance responded immediately. That had always been her strongest impression of her mother. She turned her gaze to the candle as she tried to recall further details, the wax pooling against her fingers. “She was smart as a whip, and had a clever tongue. She knew when to speak plainly and when to honey her words. They said she was the best orator in the brothel. That was how she got me my apprenticeship.” More precisely, by sleeping with the married couple who owned the leatherworking shop and then blackmailing them both, but Aviva was still young. “She could be sharp to people who angered her, but she was always kind to me. She wanted me to have a better life than she did. That was her gift to me before she died, and that’s the gift your father and I want to give you.”

Pressing the pad of her finger into the soft wax that had gathered on her thumb, Aviva contemplated her mother’s description. Then: “Do you think I’m like her?”

Esperance chuckled and slid her legs out from beneath her, letting them hang off the end of the pier. “You, my girl, are the smartest person I know.” She opened an arm and Aviva pressed against her side, holding the candle before her carefully, as if worried she would set the two of them alight. “You take after your papa in that way, too.”

Aviva hummed an acknowledgement. “Maybe I’ll name my baby Zahira.”

“Do you think you’re going to have a baby someday?” Esperance tried to keep the trepidation from her voice. There was a sudden tightness in her chest, though she could not quite place why.

A small, noncommittal shrug. “If somebody loves me.”

Esperance exhaled slowly, fear turning to deep, familiar sadness in her heart. It was such a matter-of-fact statement, filled with a weight she dearly wished the girl did not yet understand. The light inside her still burned bright, but Esperance could see it had already begun to flicker. But she would not weep. Now was not the time for despair, nor for rage at the world. Instead, she gave her daughter a squeeze and kissed the base of her horn. “Of course someone will love you, baby. I know it. You’re going to be surrounded by so much love you won’t even know what to do with it all.” Even if it was only her mother’s.

They sat in silence for a time, watching the shifting shades of grey in the fog and the white-gold of their candle flames, until each one gasped into a thin stream of smoke. “Bye, papa,” Aviva murmured.

“Bye, papa,” Esperance agreed. “May you watch over us in the arms of the Mother for another year.” Then she tilted her head back toward the city. “Fish and chips?”

A grin that would brighten any heart stretched across Aviva’s face. “Fish and chips.” The family favourite.

“Go on, then.” Pushing heavily to her feet, Esperance gestured down the pier. “Lead the way.” Aviva caught her mother’s outstretched hand and they walked, fingers intertwined, back through the mist and into the world.

**Author's Note:**

> Title song by Son Lux.
> 
> Follow me on Tumblr at @expressandadmirable for a proper table of contents for the Heroes campaign, commissioned character art, text-based roleplay snippets and more!


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